1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to lawn and garden machines and, more particularly, to a shredder attachment for use with motorized lawn and garden machines having vacuum or fan movement of shreddable material.
2. Prior Art
Various different lawn and garden machines or tools have been used in the art to perform multiple functions. One of these multiple functions is the collection of leaves, cut grass, or other material. A riding mower, for instance, can generally cut grass with either a side discharge or rear bagging of cut material. A riding mower can also use its rear bagging system to, at least partially, cut leaves and collect the leaves in its bagging system. Similarly, mobile vacuum systems have been used with riding tractors to collect leaves and hand held blower/vacuums have been used to collect and bag leaves.
A problem exists with the various different lawn and garden machines or tools used in the prior art in that, although the tools can collect leaves or other matter and bag or store the leaves for disposal, because of the relatively irregular shape of leaves, their relative rigidity, and their relatively large size, relative to the storage container, the storage container must be emptied relatively often because leaves do not lend themselves to compact storage. This is because of the leaves somewhat irregular shape and rigidity which produce relatively large air voids therebetween.
Another problem is that although leaf collectors, such as mowers, can partially cut leaves before they are moved to the leaf storage area or collecting container, lawn mowers with relatively large single blades do not shred leaves into sufficiently small pieces for compact storage. Therefore, the relatively large leaves or leaf portions that are delivered to a storage container allow for relatively large air voids therebetween and thus the storage container fills relatively rapidly requiring emptying of the storage container at relatively frequent intervals.
Another problem is that prior art leaf collectors do not sufficiently cut or shred leaves into small pieces which results in the above mentioned storage problems.
It is therefore an objective of the present invention to provide a shredder attachment for use with lawn and garden machines that can at least partially shred material, such as leaves, prior to storage in a collecting container.
It is another objective of the present invention to provide a shredder attachment for use with a leaf collector that can substantially shred leaves into relatively small pieces.
It is another objective of the present invention to provide a shredder attachment for use with a lawn or garden machine for collecting material, such as leaves, in a collecting container that can substantially diminish the size of air voids in collected material and thereby allow for collection of a larger amount of material in a container.
It is another objective of the present invention to provide a leaf shredder attachment for use in a riding mower bagging system that can allow for fewer stops for emptying of a container of the system thereby reducing the time it takes to complete the riding of the mower over a given area.
It is another objective of the present invention to provide a leaf shredder and collector that can shred leaves into relatively small pieces, thus reducing the volume of collected leaves for easier and less expensive disposal.